Louisville coach Rick Pitino has been overrated for a long time

(AP)Louisville coach Rick Pitino answers questions during a news conference after losing to Morehead State 62-61 in a Southwest regional second round NCAA tournament college basketball game, Thursday, March 17, 2011, in Denver. (AP Photo/Jack Dempsey)

Remember when John Calipari first coached at the University of Massachusetts?

Before Marcus Camby, there were still some pretty great teams. The year was 1991 and Coach Cal's first NCAA tourney team started the season 6-0. The seventh game was to be played in Rupp Arena against Rick Pitino's Kentucky team led by powerhouse all-American Jamal Mashburn.

Coach Cal milked his underdog role to the hilt, even going so far as to point out the considerable difference in the two coaches' paychecks with a reference to Pitino's "Gucci Shoes."

UMass would end up losing to Kentucky twice that season. Once in a 90-69 December blowout and then again in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA tourney in a heartbreaker.

The Minutemen, who trailed by 21 points, pulled within 70-68 with 5:49 left when official Lenny Wirtz called a technical foul on Calipari for stepping outside of the coaching box in front of the bench. The Minutemen would go on lose, 87-77, in a game that was much closer than the final score.

Kentucky would go on to lose one of the all-time classic college basketball games in NCAA history when Christian Laettner hit a shot at the buzzer in overtime in the Elite Eight to give Duke an improbable 104-103 win.

It was a heartbreaking loss for a Kentucky team that really had overachieved over the course of that season. That might have been the last time a Rick Pitino coached team overachieved.

In addition to wins and losses there are two basic ways to measure a college basketball coach's performance: recruiting and game coaching. Rick Pitino is an outstanding recruiter. He has been plucking top athletes out of the high school ranks for more than two decades.

Pitino's teams have always played fast-break basketball coupled with aggressive press defense and a willingness to take almost any open three-point shot available. This style is very appealing to young players, as it lends itself to a lot of highlight-producing steals, dunks, and three pointers, along with high-scoring basketball.

Pitino's teams have often been fun to watch but they haven't been so fun to root for when it comes to winning big games. In fact, Pitino's teams since that 1991-1992 season have been better known for not winning as much as they ought to.

Following that season, Pitino started to recruit players who were among the top high school players in the country. Rodrick Rhodes, Ron Mercer, Antoine Walker, Walter McCarty, Wayne Turner, Anthony Epps, Tony Delk, Mark Pope, Derek Anderson, Jeff Shephard, Nazr Mohammed, and Allen Edwards would all go on to spend some time in the NBA. Pitino's 1996 Kentucky team would win his only NCAA title, the only title of his career to date.

Pitino's 1995-1996 team featured eight future NBA players and barely beat a UMass team in the Final Four that went about seven players deep and featured one future NBA player, Marcus Camby. Kentucky won the title against a less talented Syracuse team two days later.

After Kentucky's championship season Pitino jumped to the NBA to embark on a disastrous tenure as head coach of the Boston Celtics, in which he drafted his own players from Kentucky, Ron Mercer and Antoine Walker. He also drafted Chauncey Billups, but wound up trading a player who would go on to win an NBA Finals MVP with the Detroit Pistons in 2004, on top of becoming a five-time NBA All-Star.

Pitino's final record of 102-146 during his tenure from 1997-2001 doesn't even begin to speak to how mismanaged and tumultuous his stay in Boston was.

Since 2001 Pitino has been the head coach of the Louisville Cardinals, taking over for departing legend and two-time NCAA champ Denny Crum. Pitino's Louisville teams have been similar to his Kentucky teams: They've featured high-profile athletic and talented recruits.

They've pressed, dunked, and shot tons of three pointers, and they have also been a perennial disappointment in the NCAA tournament. They have suffered several early tourney upsets — including yesterday when No. 13 seed Morehead State upset fourth-seeded Louisville, 62-61. Yes, they made one final four in 2004-2005 and lost to a very good Illinois team but they also have had their fair share of underperforming teams as well.

Pitino is currently the fifth-highest paid college basketball coach in the land. Yet his history suggests that he is not known for getting the most out of his very talented teams. Two coaches that make more than he does, Calipari, now at Kentucky, and Thad Motta from Ohio State, don't possess the one national title that Pitino does.

What they do have on their resumes, though, are teams with less talent performing far beyond expectations.

Pitino once had that rep; he led an unknown Providence Friar team to the 1987 Final Four and then jumped to the NBA where he led the New York Knicks back to the playoffs. Those days are long gone, though.

These days it's generally a safer bet that Pitino's teams will let their fans down rather then forge new memories of glory.

Even Pitino himself seemed to suggest that his run was waning.

"My window is closing in coaching," Pitino said following yesterday's loss.